Acacia from the Greek 'akakia' and derived from 'ake' or 'akis' meaning a sharp point or thorn and 'akazo' meaning to sharpen. Dioscorides, the Greek physician and botanist used the word in the 1st century AD for the Egyptian thorn tree, Acacia arabica. Simmonsiana named in honour of Marion and John Simmons.

Over the past two decades the Simmons have contributed significantly to promoting Australian acacias and to advancing our knowledge of this genus, Marion through her writing and illustrations and John through his photographs.

Distribution:

Found on Kangaroo Island, southern Mount Lofty Ranges, lower Murray to the upper South-east in South Australia, growing in seasonally wet, shallow depressions in undulating country, on red-brown loam over limestone or ironstone. Small isolated populations are also found in New South Wales and Victoria.

Status:

Native. Rare in South Australia. Rare in the other states.

Plant description:

Bushy, spreading shrub, commonly domed and procumbent to 2 m high and to 4 m diameter. Bark smooth and grey with branchlets reddish. Leaves slightly fleshy, glabrous, grey-green to green, oblanceolate, sometimes interspersed with a few that are narrowly elliptic, to 45 mm long and 9 mm wide. Inflorescences axillary racemes, single or twin with globular light to mid-golden flower-heads.

Fruit type:

Strongly curved black pod to 70 mm long and 4 mm wide.

Seed type:

Dark brown to black, oblong to elliptic seed to 5 mm long and 2 mm wide.

Place the pods in a tray and leave to dry for 1-2 weeks or until the pods begin to split. Then rub the dried pods to dislodge the seeds. Use a sieve to separate any unwanted material. Store the seeds with a desiccant such as dried silica beads or dry rice, in an air tight container in a cool and dry place.

Seed viability:

From two collections, the seed viability was high, ranging from 90% to 100%.

Seed germination:

This species has physical dormancy that needs to be overcome for the seed to germinate (e.g. nicking or softening the seed coat).

Seeds stored:

Location

No. of seeds(weight grams)

Numberof plants

Datecollected

Collection numberCollection location

Datestored

% Viability

Storagetemperature

BGA MSB

13000 (91.2 g)13000 (91.2 g)

50+

16-Dec-2005

PJA115Southern Lofty

1-Aug-2006

100%

-18°C

BGA

2700 (15.71 g)

40-50

20-Dec-2006

DJD (Murray)Murray

1-Aug-2007

90%

-18°C

Location: BGA — the seeds are stored at the Adelaide Botanic Gardens, MSB — the seeds are stored at the Millennium Seed Bank, Kew, England.Number of plants: This is the number of plants from which the seeds were collected.Collection location: The Herbarium of South Australia's region name.% Viability: Percentage of filled healthy seeds determined by a cut test or x-ray.